Method of making textile fabric



Patented Jan. 14, 19 31 PATENT OFFICE 7 2,228,633 METHOD OF MAKING TEXTILE FABRIC Florence D. Leech, Newark, N. J., assignor to Herman Epstein, Newark, N. J.

No Drawing. Application April 1, 1940,

- Serial No. 327,247

- 3 Claims. (01. 66-469) polychrome yarn.

Patent No. 2,186,814 to A. H. Adams discloses a method of producing such fabrics in accordance with which the phase of particular colored lengths of the yarn is checked at predetermined intervals. 10 The color design of the fabrics is prevented from wandering as it would tend on account of unavoidable inaccuracies in the color pattern repeats on the yarn, by varying the rate of yarn feed, e. g.,

tension, or by varying the size of stitches whenever the check showed the need for it.

In applying the method to hand knitting and crocheting I have found that on account of the unevenness of hand made stitches color patterns have a greater tendency to'be erratic than in machine knitting. Other aberrations became so great that portions of the fabric had to be unravelled.

. To minimize aberrations in hand knitting with polychrome yarn, and partlyalso to simplify hand knitting with such yarn, in accordance with the present invention the checking is controlled at much more frequent intervals and is efiected in thestitches rather than in the feeding of the 0 yarn to the fabric.

Preferably the color of the yarn is checked in each stitch, the pattern being laid out after correlation between the lengths of the different colored stretches and the average length of yarn 5 required for each stitch. The operator knowing, for instance, that three stitches of brown yarn followed by a stitch of white yarn are required, will make tightly or loosely the third, and possibly already the second or even first stitch of brown yarn to insure that substantially only white y'arn will go into the fourth stitch. It is possible thus sufllciently to compensate for normal variations (5 per cent or even more) in color sequence repeat lengths and obtain the predetermined colored design although a single polychrome yarn 45 is used.

The planned decorative effect is obtained by controlling in a planned relation three measurements:

(1) The length of the repeat consisting of successive stretches of brown, yellow and white;

(2) The length of the yarn used in each stitch; and

(3) The position of the color pattern of the yarn with reference to the fabric by determining the color that goes into each stitch. 10

A great variety of color and pattern effects can be produced. The variations may, of course, be multiplied by using more than one yarn feed and by distinctive stitches. Also, a group of courses knit or crocheted with one yarn may be followed by a group of courses in which a differently col- 0 cred yarn is used, or the same yarn may be shifted to different positions.

In the claims, the fabrics formed will be described as looped and the method of forming the fabric as looping to define knitted and 20,

crocheted fabrics and thelmethod of knitting and crocheting as distinguished from woven fabrics and the method of weaving.

What is claimed is: 25 1. The method of producing by hand looped fabrics of polychrome yarn having recurrent color patterns which comprises; predetermining the size of each stitch and the color of the yarn of which it will be formed, checking the color of the yarn going into the forming of each stitch, and varying the size of the stitch when the color of the yarn fed thereto differs from the predetermined color.

2. The method of looping by hand polychrome yarn of repeating pattern which comprises the steps of predetermining the average length of yarn required for a single stitch that goes into the fabric, and then forming .the stitches.

3. The method of looping by hand polychrome yarn of repeating pattern which comprises the steps of predetermining the average length of yarn required for a single stitch of the fabric, predetermining the color of each stitch, and then forming the stitches.

manner: 1:. LEECH. 

